Can you know anything?

Can you know anything?

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1+1=2

Just imagine how obnoxious of a conversationalist Socrates must have been to be executed for talking shit all the time

That phrase must have left a deep impression on Plato when he heard it, for him to use it even though his own system kind of subverts the meaning of it, in it that it allows for the possibility of knowledge.

Or perhpas he thnought that this realization is the beginning of all philosophy, just not the end of it, as the skeptics would have it.

nah

You cannot be 100% certain of anything. You can have a margin of error of 99.999% but never 100.

Socrates literally expressed doubt about this. Or maybe it was 2 plus 2.

Cogito ergo sum tbqphwy fampai

can't know nuffin I a good boy on my way to a tenure track position trying to get my life back on track

our conception of knowledge is always relative to the concept which we try to define, if you assume time and future then of course it implies infinite potential for different possibilities because you leave the question of "could have" open, the concept of potential itself is a projection of exactly what's so special about human intelligence in comparison with other organisms in general,our ability to imagine possibilities which may or may not exist, to grasp the possibility of infinity as an abstraction, we can play with the idea that everything which can be is in itself a container of possibilities, and being such is in actuality not as we perceive it to be through our limited senses, we perceive reality as humans but can conceptualize it as something which is inhuman, so human knowledge is an interpretation rather than anything concrete, it is very real but it is also always relative to the infinite number of things which makes our reality because knowledge itself is a by product of reason and not anything else.

"I don't know nuffin except knowledge is good and all people will be good bois if they know how to be good, and I know sets are valid because almost every argument I make evolves from 'x partakes of the y'. There's also reincarnation and unalterable forms beyond perception. Also I know that greek bois look like pic related -- But I no nuffin"

t. Socrates

>You can have a margin of error of 99.999%
Hopefully not, that's a pretty fucking big margin of error.

how does he doubt it? in what writing does he say this?

I have to say a lot of people have been asking this question. No, really. A lot of people come up to me and they ask me. They say, 'What's 2+2'? And I tell them look, we know what 2+2 is. We've had almost eight years of the worst kind of math you can imagine. Oh my God, can't believe it. Addition and subtraction of the 1s the 2s and the 3s. It's terrible. It's just terrible. Look, if you want to know what 2+2 is, do you want to know what 2+2 is? I'll tell you. First of all the number 2, by the way, I love the number 2 It's probably my favorite number, no it is my favorite number. You know what, it's probably more like the number two but with a lot of zeros behind it. A lot. If I'm being honest, mean, if I'm being honest. like a lot of zeros. Except for Marco Rubio, now he's a zero that I don't like. Though, l probably shouldn't say that. He's a nice guy but he's like, 10101000101, on and on, like that. He's like a computer! You know what I mean? He's like a computer. I don't know. mean, you know. So, we have all the numbers, and we can add them and subtract them and add them. TIMES them even. Did you know that? We can times them OR divide them, they don't tell that, and I'll tell you, no one is better at order of operations than me. So we're gonna be the best 2+2, believe me.

lmao were the greeks even good philosophers?

>all I know is I dunno nuffin
there

I have always believed that two plus two equals five. Now [coughs] Now Donald Trump says that two plus two is four [crowd boos], but I want to build a fairer society were two plus two equals five [collapses]

If you know nothing, how do you function? At the very least you know that you require nutrition and warmth to stay alive, this is knowledge of biology. You also know that you wish to know more, this is knowledge of morality.

genius.com/Plato-phaedo-full-text-annotated
>I should be far enough from imagining, he replied, that I knew the cause of any of them, by heaven I should; for I cannot satisfy myself that, when one is added to one, the one to which the addition is made becomes two, or that the two units added together make two by reason of the addition. I cannot understand how, when separated from the other, each of them was one and not two, and now, when they are brought together, the mere juxtaposition or meeting of them should be the cause of their becoming two: neither can I understand how the division of one is the way to make two; for then a different cause would produce the same effect,—as in the former instance the addition and juxtaposition of one to one was the cause of two, in this the separation and subtraction of one from the other would be the cause. Nor am I any longer satisfied that I understand the reason why one or anything else is either generated or destroyed or is at all, but I have in my mind some confused notion of a new method, and can never admit the other.

this is brilliant,materialists are unable to it though.

>neither can I understand how the division of one is the way to make two; for then a different cause would produce the same effect
Was he retarded? Division of one makes 0.5
The rest is a meaningless diatribe

No. Everything is interpretation, i.e. you're putting faith in a temporal instance. Knowledge, as it is defined, is a concept that cannot be practiced.

>Knowledge, as it is defined, is a concept that cannot be practiced.

You have some very odd definition of knowledge, when you can claim that you know how to tie your shoes, do tie them and still claim that your knowledge cannot be practiced.

Nowhere in Plato's writings does Socrates claim to not know anything. Saying you can never be 100% certain of something isn't exactly a deep philosophical notion either, pretentious bastards

really it's just an opinion

only worthwhile post in the entire thread

That's just your opinion.
And it's wrong.

You mean the only unintelligible post in this thread, right?

>neither can I understand how the division of one is the way to make two; for then a different cause would produce the same effect,—as in the former instance the addition and juxtaposition of one to one was the cause of two, in this the separation and subtraction of one from the other would be the cause.
Confusing the different twos. When you add 1 and 1, you're adding 1/1 unit + 1/1 unit to equal a 2/1 unit. When you separate a 1/1 unit, you get a 1/2 unit and a 1/2 unit. There are two 1/2 units created by the separation, whereas the addition created a 2/1 unit.

>Nor am I any longer satisfied that I understand the reason why one or anything else is either generated or destroyed or is at all
They aren't actually generated or destroyed, they are counted. The language is convenient but shouldn't be confused with what is occurring.

In the end, it might not matter... according to nihilism.

seems ok to me

hipsters fucking wish he looked like that, instead of the tragically ugly pug mug he really had

>You have some very odd definition of knowledge
Knowledge = factual information retained. Is that odd to you?

But there's no "factual" information. It all rests on assumptive presuppositions. Strictly speaking, knowledge is impossible.

This is knowledge from a made up system.
What do you get to know from fantasy? Nothing.

>Strictly speaking, knowledge is impossible.
Do you know that?

Are you reading me, or not? The answer is obviously no.

>The answer is obviously no.
Do you know that?

The answer is still no.

Did you think what Socrates said meant "stop thinking" or that he thought it was fact? It didn't. That means you don't understand what's being said here.

How do you know that he doesn't understand?

He seems very legit on this topic.

I'm not asserting knowledge of anything that I say.

>That means you don't understand what's being said here.
Instead of repeating myself for a third time, let's try a different method here.

>But there's no "factual" information. It all rests on assumptive presuppositions
How did you come to this conclusion? What supports it?

>How did you come to this conclusion? What supports it?
Nigger, it is literally right there. "Assumptive presuppositions."

All being interpretation and not fact does not mean I can't make declarations. Quite the contrary — I can think whatever the fuck I want, transform whatever I want into truth if need be.

So you are saying that you made an assumptive presupposition that all "knowledge" is actually assumptive presuppositions?

A clever one you are.

I'll take that as a yes, then. In which case, why not choose the opposite, even hypothetically? If it's not fact, like you said, you can think whatever the fuck you want and transform it into truth, correct?

How could I know?

>presuppositions
No

>why not choose the opposite, even hypothetically?
I choose what empowers me and suits my reasoning and goals best.

>I choose what empowers me and suits my reasoning and goals best.
I specified even hypothetically. Is it possible to choose the opposite, or would there be a constraint? If you did choose the opposite, would the definition of "knowledge" change?

>If you did choose the opposite, would the definition of "knowledge" change?
Yeah, or more specifically, the presuppositions would.

So even if you stopped presupposing that "knowledge" was a set of assumed presuppositions, they would remain presuppositions, merely changed ones?

In my current worldview, yes, but in another worldview with a different definition and set of presuppositions, there may not be any presuppositions in the equation.

>with a different definition and set of presuppositions
In other words, they would still be presuppositions, despite the worldview this alternate-you has that they are not presuppositions?

>In other words, they would still be presuppositions
To me, right now, they are and would be. They aren't and wouldn't always be though.

So, from the perspective of your alternate self, as he does not presuppose knowledge is assumed presupposition but actually is fact-based, he would have genuinely fact-based knowledge?

Sure.

What's your point?

If that is true, then the statements in and are odd. One the one hand, you state that knowledge, as it is defined, cannot be practiced because it "actually" makes use of presuppositions rater than facts. But here you are saying that if alternate-you were to define knowledge without presuppositions, he would have fact-based knowledge. Why wouldn't his "knowledge" be impossible to practice?

>alternate-you
Kind of a weird notion. Let's just go with "person B".

>Why wouldn't his "knowledge" be impossible to practice?
Because its impossibility is reliant on my own presuppositions as much as his possibility is on his.

>Because its impossibility is reliant on my own presuppositions as much as his possibility is on his.
Remember, Person B is choosing to define knowledge without presuppositions. He doesn't have them, according to the already-established reasoning.

1) I don't agree with person B, despite if I acknowledge his worldview. To me, it is valid on the premise that it relies on presuppositions like mine, but disagreeable on the premise that his worldview is not as worldview-encompassing as mine, which I view as meaning: "more truthful". Truth and lie are ends of a spectrum, not binary opposites.

2) My point was that the impossibility of knowledge in my worldview stops where my worldview ends, just like his possibility stops where his ends. But mine is farther reaching, from what I've found.

Do you see how that answers your question?

>worldview-encompassing
What does this mean?

>But mine is farther reaching, from what I've found.
In what ways?